Horace Porter

In the first week of April 1865, with his generals outmaneuvered and his troops starving and demoralized, General Robert E. Lee asked General Ulysses S. Grant for the Union's terms for surrender. Grant returned the message and arranged for a meeting with Lee at the village of Appomattox Courthouse in southern Virginia.

It was the first time Lee and Grant had met since the Mexican War of the late 1840s. At that time, both men were fighting for the government of the United States. Now they met as adversaries, with Grant having won the victory for the Union and Lee losing as the commander of the Confederate armies. Knowing the historical importance of their meeting, and that the North and the South must follow their lead and begin to heal the terrible wounds of the war, both men acted with dignity and...